


We Just Left Him Down There

by Pip_n_Flinx



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Alfred Tennyson - Freeform, Angst, F/M, Mourning, Poem Excerpt, Post-Virmire, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:07:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23608846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pip_n_Flinx/pseuds/Pip_n_Flinx
Summary: Very Short Story from the POV of Ashley Williams after the events on Virmire in Mass Effect one. This might one day make its way into a larger work, but for now its a standalone piece.
Relationships: Kaidan Alenko/Ashley Williams
Comments: 5
Kudos: 6





	We Just Left Him Down There

We just left him down there

It was a damning thought. 

It didn’t matter how many times Shepard told her it wasn’t her fault.

She knew it was.

It was a damning thought.

Shepard left him down there to save me.

I wasn’t worth saving.

Not if it cost us the Lieutenant.

Kaidan was a superior officer, damnit! Shepard chose me because I had the bigger squad. She saved the most lives. But if I hadn’t gotten cornered, if I hadn’t gotten sloppy, if I’d found better cover, if I hadn’t moved so slow, if I hadn’t gotten separated from my squad, if Kaidan hadn’t already set up the bomb, if Saren hadn’t found her, if the Reapers were just a myth, if the council hadn’t abandoned the salarian team….

It was a damning thought.

Shepard left him down there to save me.

I wasn’t worth saving.

Not if it cost us the Lieutenant.

There was another damning thought….

I loved him.

Ashley had been trying to avoid that one, but the tiltawhirl of her mind eventually spun over that. Kaidan was a handsome man, little bit of stubble, that mocha skin. It hadn’t taken her long to form a crush on him. All it took was to get him out of his armor. More than that, he seemed to be the complete package. Carrying the Commander back the Normandy they’d had a chance to talk without the pressing noise of battle. They’d stayed up a full shift together, waiting for Shepard to recover in medbay after Eden Prime. Ash eventually had to catch some shut eye, but she’d made a point of getting to know the man who stuck his neck out to get her posted on the Normandy. It wasn’t every day you got a CO like Captain Anderson.

When she’d asked him why he recommended the Normandy add her to the roster, he’d shrugged.

“It’s not every day you meet a woman who is the sole survivor of an apocalyptic event. You lost everyone but you also survived. You’re going to need Shepard. Besides, we needed a tough NCO to whip this crew into shape Chief.”

It was the little half smile afterwards that had sold her.

She was barely holding it together. No sobs wracked her, no cries nor mournful mew escaped her lips, but she could feel the rivulets of tears on her cheeks as she mouthed her desperate plea.

_Please. It should have been me, not him. Give him back, take me instead._

_Please. It should have been me, not him. Give him back, take me instead._

_Please. It should have been me, not him. Give him back, take me instead._

_Please…_ The sound of footsteps broke her reverie.

Wiping her eyes, she turned around to find Shepard standing there, eyeing her with more concern the Ash could bear at that moment.

“Commander.” Her voice was wavering. Not Good.

“About Lieutenant Alenko… How are you holding up?”

“Can’t say I’m better. Sorry for… anything I said back there. I just…. I don’t…. want any deaths on my hands, and it’s **my** fault.”

Even to herself she sounded shaken.

“I don’t like losing people either,”

“It’s funny,” Ashley could scarcely believe she had just interrupted the Commander. “I don’t have **any** fear of dying for the Alliance. But when I think of someone dying for me….”

The thought trailed off when she realized what she meant. _When I think of him dying for me…_

Snap outta it Williams.

Shepard had given her the space she needed to collect her thoughts again.

“Um, if you don’t mind my asking…. How did you deal with the losses on Akuze?”

“How did you deal with the losses on Eden Prime?”

“I had you and Alenko checking in on me, but I…. I got angry. At the time, I was angry with the Geth. I poured everything I had into scrapping them. The LT worried about me, said I wouldn’t win peace through revenge.”

“So you’re angry, but you don’t want to be angry at Saren and his Krogan. What gives Chief?”

“I can’t…. It’d be ignoring Alenko’s advice, Shepard.”

“So you think it’s better to be angry at yourself?”

Ash didn’t realize how much she’d been avoiding Jenna’s eyes until their eyes locked. Something in Shepard’s tone had shocked her. Lower, gravelier, sadder, her CO had called her out.

“I have to be worth Kaidan’s life”

And I have to live without him.

It was a damning thought.

“So, are you ready to tear Saren apart?”

The room snapped back into focus.

“We’ve got a hard fight ahead. Fleets of AI dreadnaughts, who’ve exterminated all life dozens of times over? I think the odds are against us.”

“When it comes to survival of humanity, who gives a **rats ass** about the odds? We’re gonna fight them.”

“Damn straight we will skipper!”

That’s the steadiest my voice has sounded since we broke atmo.

“But I’m infantry. Against Reapers? My rifle may as well fire spitballs. That’s what pisses me off. Doesn’t feel like it matters if I shoot back... “

She had no one to take his loss out on but herself.

It was a damning thought.

I have to be worth of Kaidan’s life.

There was another damning thought….

I never told him I loved him.

Full sobs this time, in front of my CO no less.

A hand on her shoulder, did Jenna know?

She couldn’t look up.

“Dismissed Chief.”

Footsteps, receding behind the sobs, a BDU fading behind tears. The elevator door opened, and Shepard stepped in. Kirrahe and his unit had the decency to mourn quietly. I should too.

“Oh, and Chief? Stay hydrated. You’ll have a nasty headache next shift, and I need you sharp.”

“Aye Aye ‘mam.”

  
  


“And the stately ships go on

To their haven under the hill;

But O for the touch of a vanish’d hand,

And the sound of a voice that is still!

Break, break, break,

At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!

But the tender grace of a day that is dead

Will never come back to me.”

  * Alfred Tennyson; _Break, Break, Break_




End file.
